


Stay in My Eye Line

by ItsADrizzit



Series: Deleted Scenes [1]
Category: Football RPF
Genre: Denmark National Team, Established Relationship, FIFA World Cup 2018, M/M, Netherlands National Team, Tottenham Hotspur players
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-21
Updated: 2017-11-21
Packaged: 2019-02-05 00:51:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12783339
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ItsADrizzit/pseuds/ItsADrizzit
Summary: Christian misses Vincent, and Amsterdam's not all that far away.“Why would any of us make it easier for you to continue making these abysmally bad life choices, Chris?"This work is part of a series of related works, but each can be read as a stand-alone story.





	Stay in My Eye Line

**Author's Note:**

> Title from [CHVRCHES - "Under The Tide"](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTOuVP0iYQs)
> 
> This fic technically comes after [This May Be My Last Song](http://archiveofourown.org/works/12140232) (which technically comes after [Five Times Christian Eriksen Helped His Teammates with Their Problems](http://archiveofourown.org/works/11491314), but it's not strictly necessary to read those first unless you want more background on the relationship.
> 
> All of this is made up. I was sitting in my house looking at the timing of the matches and thought "but what if Chris went to see Vincent's match" and from there a fic was born.
> 
> As always, I'm a month (and a half) behind relevancy, but here we go.
> 
> Thanks to [kaixo](http://archiveofourown.org/users/ballpoint/pseuds/kaixo) for the encouragement to just get this out and move beyond.
> 
> This is un-betaed, and un-reviewed by anyone who isn't me. All mistakes and gross abuses of the English language are my own.

**8 October, 2017—Copenhagen, Denmark**

Chris dragged himself up the steps into the team coach, collapsed into the first open seat he saw, and sank back against the plush fabric, the usual din of voices and laughter now reduced to a subdued hum. They’d all begun the day with the hopes of heading back home to their respective clubs as World Cup representatives. Instead, they'd be back here in a month to try again. Two more matches to play; one last chance to spend a summer in Russia at the World Cup instead of watching it on television while on holidays.

He’d scored a rocket of a penalty, but it hadn’t mattered in the end. Romania came back to score and Denmark hadn't managed to put a single answering shot in the back of the net. The team had been sluggish and predictable. Chris’s passes weren't sharp enough, his finishing wasn't where it needed it to be. His legs turned to jelly before they’d even made it through the first half

The worst part was, he’d done it to himself. He'd stayed up until well past one in the morning talking to Vincent after he returned to his hotel from the _Oranje_ match. Chris had known he’d regret the decision, but with Vincent usually two hours ahead of him and their busy training schedules never lining up it had been difficult for them to connect over the past month and he missed Vincent fiercely.

Besides, as his friends so often reminded him these days, when it came to Vincent he’d never been any good at making good decisions.

He slid his phone out of his pocket to find a series of text messages and WhatsApp notifications. A video from his teammates in Belgium, the three of them whooping and jumping around a hotel room at Chris’ penalty kick, Mousa flashing him a heart with his hands and Toby leaning forward to kiss the screen. Chris shook his head at the screen and clamped a hand over his mouth to stifle his laugh.

The trio had been among Chris’s closest friends for many years now—Jan and Toby since their Ajax days, Mousa joining them from almost his first day at the club—and they’d been invaluable over the past month as Chris tried to adjust to life without Vincent. Each of them had taken time away from their own lives with their partners and their children to sit with Chris while he did nothing at all of interest, just so he didn’t have to do it by himself.

When Toby had found out Chris wasn’t sleeping well he’d all but declared himself Chris’s live-in caretaker. For weeks on end he’d taken up residence in the bedroom nearest Chris’s own, waking up every time he heard Chris stirring about the house, despite Chris’s protestations that he saw no need for both of them to turn up for practice exhausted every day.

Chris clicked out of the video and scanned through the rest of his messages, mainly congratulations and encouragement from his parents and his sister. They’d been in the stands, but he’d only had a few hurried minutes to catch up with them after the match. They were staying around Copenhagen for another day and Chris’s flight wasn’t due to leave until the day after tomorrow, so he had plans to spend the entirety of the next day with them wandering about the city.

Another message popped up and Chris’ mouth involuntarily quirked into a grin as he saw Vincent’s name.

_‘I watched your match. Good thing you still remember how to score PKs since I’m not there to do it for you.’_

He shook his head and grinned down at the screen as he typed out a reply. ‘ _Yes. How dare you put this terrible burden on me._ ’

He kept the tone light, as usual—teasing words between friends, their conversations always hovering at a polite distance.

Things with Vincent were what they were, but Chris wouldn’t do either of them any good by letting himself get sentimental. He and Vincent may never be together again, at least not for any significant amount of time, and pretending they could keep up what they’d started across thousands of kilometres wasn’t going to do anybody any favours. Better to, as Toby had said, make a clean break and move beyond.

The thing was, Chris didn’t think he wanted to. Or that he could even if he did want to. He knew he shouldn’t have let himself get to that place—should have stopped it before it started—but he also knew he hadn’t been given a choice. You can’t help who you love. You could try to kick and push and wriggle your way out of it as much as you want, but, as Chris had learned, you’d just be wasting your efforts.

He typed out another message and pressed send before he could get back to talking himself out of it. As long as he insisted on this continued stupidity in regards to Vincent he may as well let himself go all in.

‘ _Are you free tonight? I’m worn out, but it would be good to see you for a bit._ ’

The screen went dark, and Chris unlocked it. Nothing. No incoming message or notification that Vincent was typing out a reply.

After he’d locked and unlocked his phone three times, Chris dropped it and leaned back in his seat, watching the lights of Copenhagen rush past him. He had almost drifted off to a doze when his phone vibrated in his lap, startling him awake. His body jerked upward and he flailed around until his fingers found the cool plastic. He ducked his head and took a quick glance around the coach, a hot flush creeping into the tips of his ears, but if anyone had noticed his wild flailing they weren’t giving any indication.

He thumbed the message open.

‘ _Call me any time you want. I promise we’ll keep it short tonight so you can get some sleep for once._ ’

‘ _I’m not the one who has training in the morning,_ ’ Chris sent back.

Vincent wasn’t wrong, though. Chris could do with crashing into his bed the moment he stepped through the door and allowing himself a lie-in the next morning before meeting his family. Still, if you couldn’t take advantage of a rare few days off to stay up until ill-advised hours of the morning chatting with your boyfriend in a different country, then what was the point, really?

‘ _I want to see you. Every second of lost sleep is more than worth it._ ’

Chris couldn't help a soft smile at Vincent’s bold sentimentality. When Vincent felt something he felt it with his entire self, no matter what, and he didn’t care who knew it. Chris, nearly the poster boy for emotional repression, couldn’t help but admire him for that.

‘ _I don’t know,_ ’ he typed. ‘ _That hardly sounds like the path to World Cup domination if you ask me._ ’

‘ _So I’ll speak with you later?_ ’ Vincent responded.

‘ _Of course._ ’

 

* * *

 

Back at the hotel, after a meeting and a team dinner that had dragged on far longer than he'd felt was strictly necessary, Chris slid into the armchair of his hotel room. In front of him, the wide windows looked out over the city. The sky was ink dark, but the lights of the streets flickered across the glass in shades of blue and red and gold.

Shouts of the bar and restaurant crowds and the hiss of traffic drifted all the way up to Chris’s room on the upper floors of the hotel, the streets alive with people from across the world.

Copenhagen was a beautiful city, full of culture and magic and energy, although it had never been his, not in the way of Amsterdam or London.

He’d grown up in Denmark, of course, but the two hundred kilometres between Middelfart and Copenhagen may as well have been two thousand. Even his childhood visits to Odense hadn’t prepared him for his first trip to the capital city. Life here moved faster--the streets never quiet, the city never asleep. The air was alive with a constant din of cars rushing past, horns blaring, the ding of bicycle bells, and the shouts and laughter of people, no matter the time of day or night.

Chris had visited many times since then, of course. The city was not unlike Amsterdam with it’s bright buzz: bicycles and tourists, boats floating lazily down the canals, the air around him filled with the smells of street food and the sounds of a dozen different languages. Copenhagen was vibrant and alive, and Chris now felt comfortable here, but it was never home.

He’d still been a child when he’d left home for Amsterdam—a teenager in a culture and city so utterly different from everything he knew—but he’d found his feet there. In Amsterdam he’d met his best friends, begun his career, and fallen in love with a culture, a city, and it’s people. The words that had started out so strange on his tongue had grown as comfortable as the language he’d spoken since birth.

London, too, had wrapped itself around him—the language and culture of England blending with his own—but Amsterdam was the city he loved the most.

He leaned back in his chair slid his headphones into his ears and dialed Vincent on FaceTime. He didn’t have a roommate to worry about, but after an awkward incident on their last international break, they’d both taken to wearing headphones during all phone conversations outside the privacy of their own homes as a matter of course.

“ _Hoi_.” Vincent answered on the third ring, his face filling the screen. Red-brown scruff covering his cheeks and chin, and Chris wished he could reach out and run his hand down Vincent’s cheek, just once, longing for the slightest contact—scrape of stubble across his hand, a quick brush of skin against skin for the briefest of seconds.

Just a second, and Chris would be satisfied. At least, that’s what he told himself.

“ _Hoi_ ,” Chris responded. Keeping the conversation in Dutch because that’s how he knew Vincent best. In Dutch, Vincent could be his truest self, relaxed and open with none of the hesitance he had when speaking in English, all quiet exuberance and blunt honesty.

“You played well,” Vincent said, and Chris couldn’t help his sharp laugh.

“I played like shit. My legs felt like jelly.”

A grin from Vincent and Chris knew he was in for a teasing. “I told you yesterday to stop talking and go to bed. Did you listen? No. Actions have consequences, you know. Guess who taught me that.”

“Your mother, I hope,” Chris replied, and Vincent pulled a face.

His hair was shorter now than it had been when he left London, and his skin tanned to a golden glow from the Istanbul sun. Still, his cheeks flushed a soft pink that was visible even under the harsh white lights of a hotel corridor.

“You’re in the corridor again,” Chris said. “At least you’re in a chair this time. It’s a miracle you can walk onto the pitch, let alone run, all that time spent sitting on the floors of hotels.”

“Well,” Vincent said, “If someone didn’t always call me just as my roommate had settled down to sleep I wouldn’t be in this situation.”

Chris bit at his bottom lip and Vincent’s eyebrows quirked. “Stop that. You know that drives me mad for you.”

Chris’s mouth twitched as he fought to keep his face serious. “Does it? Just that? That’s it? The rest of it is just whatever? After I spent all that time and money trying to impress you, this is all I had to do?”

“ _Christiaan_ …” Vincent started and Chris laughed.

“You’re such a windup.” Chris had spend too much time in England; the phrasing had started to creep in around the edges of his words. “How was training?”

The smile dropped off Vincent’s face and Chris immediately regretted his question. He’d thought perhaps they would be more comfortable talking about training instead of once more skirting dangerously close to a conversation about how much they missed one another, how Chris wished Vincent had made a different choice and wasn't hours away by plane instead of close enough that Chris could pop down for a walk along Brighton Pier whenever they could both manage a day off.

“It…training is good. The same as ever, you know? Routine. We’re trying to stay hopeful, to believe that we can overcome, but…”

One match stood between _Oranje_ and the World Cup, but the odds were nearly insurmountable. They'd need to put up seven goals on a red hot Swedish team to even give themselves a chance.

“All you can do is play your game,” Chris said. “Keep your head up. Make the runs. Score as many as you can. It’s a hard situation, I know, but there’s nothing you can accomplish by worrying about it. You have the skills and you’re coming into form right now. It will be a hard task, but you have to believe you can do it.”

“I know this, but…seven goals. The most we’ve managed in one match all season is five, and that was…” Vincent trailed off and took a deep breath. “To ask this is… “

“It’s what you have to do.”

“We shouldn’t be in this situation. We should have done better from the start. It all comes to goal difference and if I hadn’t missed so many chances earlier on we would be ahead. I’ve let the team down. The country down. The whole world asking how we can miss out on two major tournaments in a row. The last time this happened is before any of us can remember. We’ve always been a fixture. I have teammates who almost won the World Cup and now…”

Chris held a hand up and shook his head. He was careful to speak with a calm reassurance, although he let in some of the authoritative tone of a veteran player speaking to his junior. He and Vincent might be whatever they were, but above all else they were still teammates. Technically.

“Stop this. Listen to me. You are not the whole team. You are not the only striker. You are not the only one responsible. This is not on you.”

Vincent’s face twisted into anguish, and Chris felt his own face fall into a frown at the sight. He wished they were back in London, where Chris could grab Vincent and kiss away the lines of worry creasing his forehead.

“It is on me. All the chances I’ve missed. The offside calls. The number of times I’ve pulled a shot wide and failed to finish.”

“ _Liefje_ ,” Chris said, using the diminutive he’d taken to calling Vincent instead of his name whenever they were somewhere their conversations might be overheard. “You cannot take this all on yourself. For one thing, you’ll kill yourself with it. You know how football works. Eleven people on the field all working together. It’s not just you, it’s everyone. It’s the players and the coaches and the tactics and decisions and, yes, a little bit of bad luck. Right now, all you can do is focus, do your best, and believe you can make it through.”

“Seven goals, _lieveke_. Seven. That’s…it might as well be a million.”

Chris gave Vincent what he hoped was an encouraging smile, then pressed the phone screen to his lips. “Then score a million goals.”

A shake of Vincent’s head and he forced a smile in return. “Maybe if I had your perfect crosses straight to my feet I could at least manage one.”

Chris opened his mouth to respond, but found that he had nothing to say. What was there? They’d been over it all before and there remained nothing either of them could do. Things with Vincent and Spurs hadn’t worked out, despite all their best efforts, and dwelling on what might have been couldn’t lead anywhere but regret, anger, and pain. Neither of them needed any more of that than they already had.

Vincent leaned his head back against the wall. “I really wish you were here.”

His expression held a kind of softness, but something more as well. Anxiety and sadness and the deep, aching need Chris had come to understand all too well. At that moment, Chris wished he were there, too.

Instead, he forced himself to take a breath and drag his eyes away from Vincent’s for a second before speaking.

“I should go now and not distract you any more. Get some sleep, you certainly won’t be at your best if you’re exhausted because I kept you up. _Succes_ in your match if I don’t speak with you beforehand.”

“Are you around tomorrow?” Vincent asked.

“Focus on your match. Spend time with your teammates. Don’t worry about me.”

Vincent started to protest, but Chris shook his head.

“Go to sleep. Train hard. Focus. Rest. Call me after your victory party, okay?”

Silence dragged between them until Vincent blurted out, “I love you. I know I’m not supposed to say that because you’re still in London and I’m in Istanbul and I’m trying not to think about where my stubbornness got us, but—”

Chris cut him off. “I love you, too. Get some sleep. Train well. We’ll speak when we can.”

A smile that Chris couldn’t help but return. “Good night, _lieveke_.”

“Good night, _liefje_.

 

* * *

 

Chris hung up the phone and dragged himself out of his chair, his legs still weak beneath him, a deep ache in the muscles despite a post-match massage and the five litres of water he’d consumed in the past few hours.

He lay in his bed, staring up at the ceiling of his room. Lights from the streets crept in the windows and cast patterns across the stark white of the walls. He thought about getting up to draw the curtains closed, but decided it wasn’t worth the effort of walking the few metres.

He’d almost gotten used to this, laying in bed watching the light from the street outside make shadows dance on the ceiling. Ironically, less so since he’d left his house in London for a string of hotel rooms in Denmark and beyond. The snatches of sleep on airplanes or coaches or in foreign hotel beds had been the best he’d managed in weeks. _In a month_. One month to the day since the last time he slept beside Vincent.

He pulled the blankets around him in a sort of cocoon, a protective measure developed the night Toby had piled every blanket in the house on the bed after the fifth time he’d intercepted Chris sneaking onto the sofa because the bed was too cold. It wasn’t even a remotely good substitute for the warm presence of Vincent in his bed, but it helped a bit, at least.

Now, as he closed his eyes and listened to the hum of the heating system and the faint sounds of the street outside, Christian stretched out across the mattress, thankful, in a way, for it’s vague discomfort—a reminder that this wasn’t the bed he’d shared with Vincent. Vincent wasn’t supposed to be beside him here anyway. Far from home, where everything was simultaneously strange yet vaguely familiar, Chris felt less like a piece of his life had gone missing. He could almost convince himself that a few days from now when he arrived back in London Vincent would be waiting for him and all of this would be nothing but a dream.

Vincent’s words echoed through his mind. “I wish you were here.”

The way Vincent’s face had fallen when Chris had mentioned practice, the team. The pained look of hopelessness and desperation that Chris had hoped Vincent would leave behind in London.

Chris had to admit that even he didn’t have much hope for the Netherlands qualifying at this point. Seven goals in one match was an insurmountable obstacle, even for an in-form team radiating confidence—something _Oranje_ hadn’t been accused of in years. Still, sometimes in football amazing things could happen. Until the final whistle blew, there was always hope.

If they didn’t succeed, Vincent would take it on himself the way he always did. Chris could already recite the mantra: ‘ _I’m the striker, Chris, it’s my job to score the goals. I wasn’t good enough. I’ll never be good enough. It’s not enough._ ’ The pressures placed on Vincent—by himself, but also by his teammates and the manager and the media—were far from fair, but things in football rarely were. Still, Chris hated the thought of Vincent having to deal with the guilt heaped on him by this pile of things that weren’t his fault, at least not his alone, all on his own.

Chris rolled onto his side and tried to sleep. He sucked eep breaths in and out, filling his lungs all the way, then counting to five as he let the air out, trying to relax his mind. Vincent would be fine, whatever happened. He was strong. He had his friends and his teammates to see him through whatever came their way.

Vincent’s face crept unbidden into his mind, twisted into a grimace as he lay on the grass in front of the goal. Dropping his head to his hands as he let out an anguished scream.

The same grimace Chris had seen so often during Vincent’s time at Spurs. Equally as often whenever Chris managed to catch an _Oranje_ match over the past few months. Chris hated the way it made his heart twist in his chest and made him want to reach out and wrap Vincent in his arms and kiss his hair and tell him that everything was going to be okay.

His friends would tell him not to dwell on it. They'd be quick to remind him, as they had so many times before, that some brief contact may seem like a good idea, but it would only make things worse in the end. They were right, Chris knew. They were always right.

Still, Chris hadn’t regretted any of the phone calls or messages or late nights, not even after he’d driven himself to physical illness a few weeks ago after watching Vincent play against Beşikaş in an ugly gritty, physical brawl of a derby.

Despite the protestations of his friends, he’d insisted on digging up the dodgiest stream in the world so he could watch Vincent's match. Vincent had played well and had looked happy—his face turned in his stunning smile instead of the dejected grimace that had become his usual expression over his past few month with Spurs, and Chris had let that smile radiate through himself. _It's okay_ , he told himself. All these nights alone and days spent missing Vincent's presence had been worth it if it meant Vincent could find his feet and Chris could wash himself in Vincent's exuberance once more.

Only it hadn't worked, not really. Somehow, after two hours spent alternating between burying his face in his hands and screaming at the television until his voice was hoarse, Chris had missed Vincent more than ever, just as his friends had warned he would. Instead of the buzzing warmth he'd hoped to find in watching Vincent's success, his whole body ached and he'd been able to do nothing but collapse breathless and boneless onto the sofa and bury his head in his arms, longing for Vincent's limbs wrapped around him and the feel of Vincent's skin against his own once more. That night, as he had so many others, he'd lain awake in bed, every nerve in his body pulsing and his body spent to physical exhaustion, willing himself to sleep but never quite getting there. This time, though his whole body ached, his head pounded, and his stomach roiled with every movement. Eventually ,he'd found himself sprawled, sweating and shivering, on the cold tile of his bathroom floor with only strength enough to pull himself upward so he could retch into the toilet.

“ _I wish you were here._ ”

Chris turned over and stared up at the ceiling once again.

He’d planned on spending the next day with his family in Copenhagen and flying back to London the day after—the day of Vincent’s match—but he wasn’t expected back to training until Thursday and the match was on Tuesday. Even if he took an extra day, he’d still be back to London in plenty of time. He could call his agent, get the flight re-scheduled. Re-route through Amsterdam.

It wouldn’t be too odd a request, really. A quick trip to his former home was something he did not infrequently, whenever he was able. He still had friends in the city, and if anyone really pressed him he could say he wanted to be at the match to support his former teammates. It wouldn't even be a lie, really, and if anyone wanted to assume he meant his Ajax teammates, well…that was on them, wasn’t it?

He sighed. _Stupid, Chris. So stupid._ But, according to his friends, everything he did where Vincent was concerned was stupid. Why stop now?

If he did rearrange his plans and fly to Amsterdam on a whim he knew all he’d get in return were a few snatched moments with Vincent as the two of them stood by the side of the pitch or tucked away in a carpark somewhere, surrounded by teammates and coaches and fans and cameras as he wrapped Vincent in a hug that was too short and didn’t allow him nearly enough contact with Vincent’s body. Congratulations on the match. Condolences on the situation.

He would be able to do nothing but whisper cliché platitudes in Vincent’s ear—‘ _You played well. I’m proud of you. You did all you could do. This isn’t your fault._ ’—instead of saying what he really meant: ‘ _I miss you. I’m falling apart without you. London isn’t the same and life is empty without you in it. I want to play alongside you again and watch you run and see you smile. To feel your skin on mine and your mouth against my own. I love you Vincent. Come home to me_.’

All these words Chris wouldn’t let himself speak even if they _weren’t_ standing in a crowd, because what good would they serve. What was done was done, and there was no going back, only forward.

 

 

 

**9 October, 2017—Copenhagen, Denmark**

“Stop laughing and tell me you’ll help me.” Chris leaned into his chair and dropped his phone to his lap, doing his best to ignore the chorus of laughter pouring out of the tiny speaker.

He didn’t have time for this. He was due for coffee with his family in twenty minutes.

He’d been on the phone since he’d woken up to the first rays of sun streaming in his windows that morning. He's suffered through another sleepless night that he really couldn’t afford, although this time it wasn't because he missed Vincent, but because his mind was spinning in a million directions at once as he worked through his plans.

First, he'd made a call to his agent to change his flight. Martin, bless him, hadn’t asked for an explanation—sports agents were notoriously good at not asking their clients 'why'—but Chris wasn’t prone to rash behaviour, so he’d offered one anyway, saying he missed the city and wanted to make a quick stop to see some friends since he had some time before he needed to be back.

It wasn’t too far-fetched. Amsterdam had been his home, and Chris wasn’t an infrequent visitor to the city. This would be nothing too out of the ordinary, just a player taking a day to unwind before diving back into the rigours of the Premier League season.

Next, a phone call to the Conservatorium Hotel where Chris booked himself into one of the smaller suites. The extravagance was possibly unnecessary considering there was no guarantee he’d even get to speak with Vincent let alone get him away from the team long enough to spend some time in Chris’s hotel room. Still, slim though it may be, he had a chance to spend one more night with Vincent before they were back on separate continents for who knew how long, and Chris wanted to spare no expense.

He’d saved the most difficult part—getting tickets to this match—for last, putting it off as long as possible. Rearranging flights and making hotel accommodations was nothing compared to the favours he’d have to call in to get the tickets he needed and who he’d have to call to get them. He probably could have asked Martin to handle that, as well, but rounding up tickets for someone else’s National Team matches wasn’t really his job.

Plus, the fewer people that knew Chris's exact plans, the better. Mostly because Chris had no desire to explain to anyone what he was doing watching the Netherlands National Team. Sure, he could come up with some perfectly reasonable explanation about supporting former teammates or some lingering sentimentality for the country, but the last thing he needed was to deal with any potential media circus. Once the media was involved, everything would get a lot messier and Chris needed this to be as uncomplicated as flying into a country on a whim and watching your secret love interest play football without said love interest or anyone else noticing could be.

The problem was, in order to get tickets without going through his agent or a player liaison, he’d have to call and ask a favour of the absolute last person he wanted to owe anything.

Which was how he found himself on the phone with Toby, Jan, and Mousa—all of them crowded around Jan’s speakerphone in a Brussels hotel room—begging one of them to please make this phone call and get him a ticket so he didn’t have to.

“Why would any of us make it easier for you to continue making these abysmally bad life choices, Chris?” Toby asked.

“Please don’t make me call him.” Chris was ordinarily above begging, especially when he knew his friends would hold it over him for as long as they could, but these were extenuating circumstances.

“ _Christiaan_ ,” Toby said in the disapproving tone of a Dutch _opa_ he reserved for whenever Chris was being particularly stupid about something involving Vincent. “If you want to do something this monumentally idiotic, then you’re going to have to work for it. I’m certainly not going to enable you.”

“Nor I,” Jan said.

“Well I’m not doing it,” Mousa said with a shrug. “But don’t think I don’t want to find out what happens when you do. I sort of wish we could watch it over a group chat.”

Chris threw a hand in the air. “I thought friends were supposed to help and support one another in their time of need.”

“How badly do you want to do this, Chris?” Jan asked. “Bad enough that you’re willing to go through all of this? Think on it.”

His friends were being insufferable, but Chris couldn’t blame them for it. The whole thing was probably hilarious, really, if you weren’t the one who had to call your ex and ask him to get you tickets to watch your current boyfriend, who was on the same team as your ex, play a match. With the added complication that as far as Chris was aware neither of them knew about his involvement with the other.

When had Chris’s life gotten this complicated? All he’d ever wanted to do was put his head down and play football, not end up in a string of problematic relationships with members of the Dutch National Team.

“And what am I supposed to say to him when I call? ‘Hi, sorry I’ve been going out of my way to ignore you for five years. Can you get me a ticket to your match today? Thanks, that’s so great of you. Just so you know, this doesn’t make us friends or anything, I just really need a ticket and you’re the only one I can call. Okay?”

“Overdramatic much?” Mousa asked, raising one eyebrow.

Chris fixed him with a glare. “You weren’t there. You have no idea what it was like with him. It wasn’t just the breakup, it was…” Chris trailed off. He definitely didn’t have the time or energy to get into it.

“Anyway,” he continued. “My point is, there is no way to say ‘I want a ticket somewhere I can get a good view of the field and your bench, but in a non-conspicuous area where no one will know I’m there. Oh, and also you can’t tell anyone.’ that doesn’t make me sound like a stalker. You know him. He’s not going to let that go without a million questions I don’t really want to answer.”

Toby rolled his eyes, “Yes and us calling and asking if he can set aside a ticket for someone, but obviously not one of us because we have a match that day, won’t make him at all suspicious.”

“At least _I_ won’t have to answer the questions. And he won’t know it’s me unless you tell him.”

Toby snorted. “No, I swear it’s for some other mutual friend who just wants to creepily watch your match. Sure, Chris, that’s believable.”

Chris rolled his eyes. His friends were right, as usual; that still didn’t mean he wanted to make this phone call.

“God, Toby, you know I can’t call him.”

“Good,” Toby said. “Then, you can go back home to London tomorrow and forget all of this stupidity and we’ll all see you in a few days.”

“You know I’m not going to to do that.”

“Fine. Make bad choices if you want to. I’m certainly not helping you do it. You know my opinion on the whole situation. I’ll see you at home.” He waved his hand at the phone screen and Jan and Mousa followed suit.

“Bye Chris,” Jan said.

“See you later,” Mousa added.

Before Chris could even get his protest out, the screen went  dark.

Fantastic. Some friends he had.

He sighed and leaned back in his chair. Ten minutes until his coffee appointment. He should just put on his coat, walk the few blocks to the café, play tourist for a while, treat everyone to lunch out and whatever they wanted at the shops, and forget all about the problems of his life for a day.

Better yet, he could actually listen to Toby for once and call the whole thing off right now. He should ring Martin back and tell him he was sorry, but he changed his mind and wouldn’t need the new arrangements after all. It was a terrible thing to do and he hated the idea of being such a difficult client, but, honestly, his friends were right and it was in his best interest to just head straight back to London in the morning.

He slid open his phone, flicking open his contact list and scrolling through until he found the right name. Why he still carried this number around in his phone, he had no idea. It wasn’t as though he’d ever planned on reaching out again.

He held his breath, clicked on it, typed a message, and pressed send before he could change his mind.

 _Hey, it’s Chris. Do you have a minute?_ ’

He leaned back in his chair, phone clutched in his hand, and stared down at the screen until it went dark. No response. Maybe he was already at training.

Or maybe, he just wasn’t in any hurry to answer an out-of-the-blue text from someone who hadn’t spoken to him in years aside from the requisite handshakes and ‘nice match’ whenever they played one another.

Chris couldn’t say he’d blame him. He certainly wouldn’t be in a hurry to respond if the roles had been reversed.

A minute later he'd still received no response and it was past time for him to leave.

That was that, then. As soon as Chris finished breakfast he’d call Martin and see if he could round up a ticket or two. Not that Chris needed two, but it was probably more believable that Chris would be taking a friend rather than showing up alone. Or he could just turn up at the arena tomorrow and try to stay inconspicuous while buying his own ticket.

He shoved his phone in his pocket where he’d feel it buzz if a message came in. He was already going to be late, there was no sense waiting around to see if someone may or may not message him back.

He shoved his feet into some trainers, grabbed his leather jacket from it’s hook near the door, and headed out to meet his family for coffee and breakfast.

 

* * *

 

He’d made it halfway through his breakfast when his phone—now long forgotten in the pocket of his jeans—started ringing, the sensation shaking his entire leg and nearly making him jump out of his chair.

He held it together, just, managing to keep his focus on his mother, who was in the middle of a story about Chris’s cousin’s neighbours’ son’s first match with the Odense academy, and calmly slid his phone onto his knee. He flicked his glance downward for a second, and cursed to himself as he saw Daley Blind’s name across the screen.

To be fair, Daley had probably been at the team breakfast when Chris had messaged him, and he certainly had no way of knowing Chris was out with his family. It was just so typically Daley to happen to call at the least convenient time possible.

Chris swiped at the screen to ignore the call. He’d ring Daley back after breakfast while he was inevitably waiting for his mother and sister to finish up at one of the shops.

Before he could slide his phone back into his pocket, it buzzed again. Once. Then twice. Then a third time.

Chris chewed at his tongue and tried not to stare down at the now silent phone. Waiting for…what, exactly?

“Christian?” his mother asked him. “Is everything alright, love?”

“Hmm,” Chris said. “Oh. Yes, I just…phone call. It’s…I can return it later. It’s not important.”

Not strictly true, but he wasn’t about to tell his parents Daley Blind—yes, _that_ Daley Blind—was calling him.

The last thing he needed was a presser about what Daley was doing back in his life. Which would inevitably need to more questions about his life in general. Which, he knew, despite his best efforts would somehow lead to Vincent. He was definitely not ready to talk about Vincent.

This was supposed to be a nice day out with his family, not another round of ‘our son is one of the best footballers in the world, but he makes such tragic choices when it comes to his love life’. Not today.

Chris picked up his phone and started to shove it back into his pocket, when it started ringing again. Startled, he nearly dropped it, fumbling around and grabbing it just before it hit the edge of the chair and tumbled to the floor.

Unfortunately, in doing so, his thumb accidentally slid across the screen to accept the call and Chris could hear Daley’s voice drifting faintly up at him through the tiny speaker.

 _Shit_.

“Uhh,” Chris said, looking up at his family. “I um. One second. Sorry.”

He lifted the phone to his ear to hear Daley now yelling his name in increasing tones of confusion, and whispered in Dutch. “I’m here. Sorry. Can you just…can I call you back?”

“What?” Daley’s voice shifted from confusion to annoyance. “No you can’t fucking call me back? You message me out of nowhere to ask me for some unnamed favour and then I call you to find out what it is and first you ignore my call then you ask if you can call me back? What the hell, Christian?”

Christian puffed out his cheeks as he sighed. “I’m at breakfast with my family right now. I’ll call you in, I don’t know, half an hour?”

“I have training. What do you want?”

Ugh. _For fanden_. There was nothing for it then. If he wanted to get this taken care of he’d have to deal with it now.

“Fine. Hold on. Let me go outside.” He stood up and smiled apologetically at his family. “Sorry, I actually do have to take this. I’m so sorry. Please finish eating. Here…” he dug in his pocket for his wallet and handed it to his father. “If I’m not back before you’re finished please use this to pay for everything. I’ll try not to be long.”

He pushed his chair backward, squeezing himself between his father and the woman behind him with a string of “excuse me, I’m so sorry. Sorry to interrupt. Sorry.” and rushed toward the front of the restaurant and out the door to the street.

The crisp wind of Danish fall slammed Chris in the face as he stepped out of the warmth of the restaurant, phone in hand. The sidewalks were slowly filling with bicycles and tourists and people on their way to and from work after a stop for their morning coffee, and Chris scanned the street for an out of the way place to stand. _Preferably somewhere out of the wind_ , he thought, rubbing the arm holding the phone with his free hand. He hadn’t stopped to grab his coat in his haste to be anywhere that wasn’t in the middle of his family while having this conversation.

He settled on a spot alongside the restaurant under an awning. There were tables outside, lining the sidewalk, but the early morning chill kept away only the bravest of people, so most of the chairs were empty. The Danes were a stubborn and proud people, especially when it came to weather, but most of them weren’t stupid.

Leaning against the wall of the building in the shelter of an awning, he lifted his phone to his ear.

“Daley?”

For a few seconds Chris heard nothing but silence. Maybe he’d hung up. Gotten so fed up with how long Chris was taking that he’d given up. Or gotten called away for training.

“Christian what do you want?”

Daley’s words were clipped as they rushed out of him in a string of rapid fire Dutch that Chris had to struggle to keep up with.

“I…uhh…”

_Yes, Christian. Nice work. Eloquently spoken as always._

“I…” Chris tried again before his brain caught up, scrolling through thoughts and languages until he landed on the right combination. “I was hoping you could…do me a favour?” He dragged out the end of the sentence, pitching the end up a bit so it sounded like a question. Now that he was standing here on the freezing cold Copenhagen street listening to the familiar voice of a man he had once told he never wanted to speak to again, those words sounded monumentally stupid.

A sharp laugh on the other end of the phone. It wasn't Daley’s usual light, musical laugh. This one was breathy and sarcastic, and Chris definitely deserved that. “You barely speak to me for five years and now you want a favour?”

 _And that was it_ , Chris thought. He couldn’t do this. Couldn’t sit here and ask anything of Daley Blind—who he’d loved so madly despite all the warnings he’d gotten to the contrary and who’d treated everything in his whole life, even Chris, as a joke. Chris had been swept away by Daley’s constant smiles and laughter, the easy way he would reach out and throw an arm around Chris while they were out in the city and then, when Chris's spine would stiffen and he'd try to duck out of Daley's grasp, would smile down at Chris with those charming dimples and say “Let them talk, a little speculation is good for the press.”

Chris’s days had been filled with brightness and laughter and happiness right up until the day Daley had turned the whole thing on its head.

Daley had never understood how Chris could choose a career over everything. Chris had always wondered how Daley could do the opposite—treating football as the thing that mattered least.

They’d fallen out and fallen apart, and Chris had been a mess while Daley, predictably, had shrugged the whole thing off and went about his life as though nothing had happened. A few weeks later he'd turned up to a team dinner with Jasper on his arm, both of them oblivious to the way Chris spent the entire dinner in misery, counting the seconds until he could flee back to the solace of his room.

Looking back on things, Daley and Jasper made much more sense, both of them with an easy, carefree manner and brilliant smiles. They’d been together ever since, even through Daley’s move to Manchester and Jasper’s move to Spain, and Chris could only hope that someday he’d find something like that. That perhaps this thing with Vincent…well, a hope, at any rate.

Daley’s voice cut back through his thoughts, still clipped and short, but with a little of the edge fallen away and some of the characteristic lightness creeping back in. “What do you need, Chris?”

Chris blew out a deep breath. Nothing for it, then.

“I was…” he trailed off again. _Just spit it out, Christian. The sooner you get this over with, the sooner you can be back inside finishing your coffee and pretending none of this ever had to happen._

“Can you get me a ticket for your match tomorrow?” The words exploded out of him in a rush before he could stop them; before he could hang up the phone, go back inside, finish his breakfast, and do his best to lose his mobile in the city somewhere so Daley couldn’t call him back.

“You…what?” Daley didn’t bother with the clipped annoyance anymore, now just bemused confusion. “You want to go to our match?”

“I was hoping to,” Chris said. “If I can get a ticket.”

“What do you need me for?” Daley asked. “The match isn’t sold out yet. Just buy one.”

“I…don’t really want anyone to know I’m there. So I need a ticket—just one—somewhere I can see the field well, maybe near the bench, but not too obvious or conspicuous. No press. No cameras. Do you think you can do that for me?”

A long pause, and Chris could picture Daley narrowing his eyes as he worked through what Chris had just said. “That’s…oddly specific. What are you up to?”

Chris dropped his head back against the brick wall behind him, regretting it instantly as the cold of the stone seeped through him and he stepped forward. He needed to wrap this up and get out of this wind.

“Daley, _for fanden_. Can you get me a ticket or not?”

“I can,” Daley said, the lighthearted amusement in his tone telling Chris he was in for more of a struggle than he cared to deal with. “But are you seriously asking me to help you sneak in and watch our match under cover of darkness using covert operations and all this bullshit without even a hint of an explanation as to why?”

Chris bit his lip and squeezed his eyes shut and prayed to whatever entities that might be listening that he could somehow manage to pacify Daley into not continuing to press him for more information.

“Sorry,” he said. “I just…I have my reasons, okay? Let’s just say…I’d rather certain people didn’t know I was at the match, at least not until it’s over.”

Daley’s laugh on the other end of the phone was a deep, infectious, musical giggle that meant Chris's prayers definitely hadn’t been answered.

“Christian Eriksen, are you stalking my teammates?”

Chris ground his fist into his forehead.

“For fuck’s sake, Daley, this is why I didn’t want to ask you,” he blurted out before his brain could tell his mouth to stop, and _great, Chris, that should help endear him to your cause._

“Fine way to treat someone you ask for a favour out of nowhere after five years of ignoring them even though you live in the same country.” Daley’s tone was still playful and amused, but that didn’t make his words any less true.

Chris rolled his eyes. There was no way he was getting out of this without at least an admission of guilt. Maybe if he gave Daley that much he would be satisfied and not press Chris any further into telling him who it was. Highly unlikely, but a person could dream, right?

“Fine,” Chris said with a sigh. “Yes. I’m going to see someone specific. No, I will not tell you who it is, because you have the biggest mouth in the entire world and there’s no way you’d be able to keep any secret even if you were sworn to protect it under penalty of death. I don’t want him to know I’m there. He’s got enough to deal with without me.”

A silence on the other end that stretched into eternity and Chris was pretty convinced that if he didn’t get back inside soon he’d never regain feeling in his arms.

“Daley, listen, I have to go. Just…get me a ticket. Can you hold it somewhere for me and I’ll pick it up before the match?”

Another silence stretching between them, and then Daley finally spoke. “Only if you tell me who it is.”

Daley’s tone was now laced with all the cheek of a man who knew he had the upper hand and wasn’t afraid to use it. How had Chris ever found this anything other than infuriating?

“Daley, leave it alone” Chris clenched the hand not holding the phone into a fist and desperately grasped for a way to get out of this that didn’t involve him telling Daley Blind anything about anything having to do with Vincent.

The thing was, even if Chris told Daley to forget it and figured out his own way into the match, he’d given Daley way too much to go on already. If Chris didn’t at least give him the promise that he’d tell Daley the truth eventually, the first thing he’d do is start working on figuring things out. Which would lead to him asking a whole bunch of people a whole bunch of questions that neither Chris nor Vincent needed asked.

“Fine,” Chris stepped farther away from the wall and inched toward the door of the restaurant. “If I consider possibly telling you after the match will you get me a ticket and promise not to go digging around asking questions that will blow my cover?”

Another long silence before Daley blew out an overdramatic sigh that had Chris rolling his eyes and regretting ever making this call. _The things we do for love_ he thought _or…lust or…whatever this was_. “I suppose that will have to do,” Daley said. “But, you have to promise to come say hello to me at the match. I haven’t seen you in forever. And you owe me coffee next time I’m in London.”

And that was fair. Daley had been a huge part of Chris’s life for more than three years. Sure, what had happened between them had stung, but Chris was over it. He and Daley had been friends before, and there was no reason they couldn’t at least get together once in awhile when they found themselves in the same city.

“Fine, Daley. Fine. You’re right. I’ve been a bit of a wanker. There’s no reason we can’t at least be…friends or…whatever.”

“See you tomorrow, Chris. I’ll leave the tickets at the window for you.”

The line went dead, and Chris shook his head at his phone, shoved it in his pocket, and rushed back into the merciful warmth of the restaurant.

 

 

 

**10 October, 2017—Amsterdam, The Netherlands**

The Amsterdam morning was cold and grey, the sky spitting a light mist of rain as Chris stepped out of Schiphol Airport and into the waiting taxi.

Chris had woken early that morning, too nervous and excited to sleep. He’d managed to doze for a few moments mid-flight, but he could barely keep his eyes open long enough to greet the driver with a smile and give him the name of his hotel. He slid his phone out of his pocket, hoping for some distraction that would keep him awake long enough to make the fifteen kilometre drive to the _Centrum_.

He flicked open his WhatsApp and stared down at it. No harm in sending a message, really. It wouldn't be anything out of the ordinary, especially since Vincent would assume he was sitting in an airport, bored out of his skull while waiting for a flight back to London.

‘Succes _today. Keep your head up. I’m here for you._ ’

It was a carefully calculated message that wouldn't give anything away. He was skirting the truth, but Vincent didn’t need to know all the specifics.

He stared down at the phone for a while, but received no response. Vincent’s status showed as offline. It was just after 10:30 in the morning, so he was probably just finishing breakfast or getting in a bit of morning training before the match.

Chris sank back against the seat and dropped his phone to his lap, rubbing at his eyes. He stared out the window. Morning traffic rushed past, late arrivers still heading into the city centre, although at this time of day the vehicles were mainly delivery trucks with bright images of vegetables and fish painted on the sides. This far out of the city, he could be anywhere, surrounded by concrete and trees, the buildings non-descript, but all of it with the familiar feel of coming home.

“What brings you to the city?”

The driver’s voice interrupted Chris’s thoughts, speaking in accented English.

“Football,” Chris answered without thinking, and that was harmless, really. He might be recognised here, although he'd been gone for some time. Still, there was nothing to do but hope he'd be seen as just another of the nameless, faceless masses crowding into the city for the match.

The driver nodded. “Yes, a big match. Very important day for _Oranje_. They will win, I think, but it is already too late. A major disappointment. Not enough goals. Janssen with such promise at AZ, but now we see the truth.”

Chris’s breath hitched, his throat tight, and he wanted to speak up. He longed to rush to Vincent’s defense and explain to the man how he didn’t understand, not really. He didn’t know Vincent. He didn't see how hard he worked every day. Sometimes, Chris wanted to scream from the rooftops that Vincent was a good footballer who was just misused and misunderstood.

Instead, he bit his tongue until he couldn’t stand the pain anymore, then closed his eyes with a shrug.

“Maybe so,” Chris said in response. “Whatever the case, I hope they will win today.”

The driver didn’t respond, and Chris didn’t push, content to ride the rest of the way into the city in silence.

He lifted his phone again, checking to see if anything had changed, although he would have felt the buzz of an incoming message. No change, of course. Vincent remained offline.

Ten minutes later, the taxi pulled off the highway and rounded the corner onto the S106 into the _Centrum_ and Chris’s heart lifted at the sight of his former home. The shop windows and signs had changed, but the streets and buildings remained the same. They crossed the bridge over the canal on the _Surinamestraat_. All around, the streets were crowded with bicyclists and people rushing along the sidewalks in the light rain. To the left, the trains clattered into and out of the station, and Chris breathed a sigh.

 _Home_.

After a right turn onto _Van Baerlestraat_ past the _Vondelpark_ , they arrived. Amsterdam's _Conservatiorium Hotel_ rose from the sidewalks in towering angles of brick and stone, cut through with wide, curving windows—the height of luxury in the middle of the city. Chris didn’t usually stay somewhere like this, instead opting for one of the more modern hotels a bit further out, but for this trip, he’d spared no expense, wanting everything to be perfect just in case.

He climbed from the cab, smiling and thanking the driver for his time, and made his way toward the hotel. He stepped past the doorman and the concierge with a polite nod and smile, refusing the services of the bellman who offered to wheel his bag with a polite “ _Nee, dank u wel_.”

He gave his name at the desk, hoping whomever he’d spoken with the day before had actually made the note about early arrival. He was dead on his feet and he was looking forward to nothing more than taking the lift to his room, dropping his bag in the corner, and collapsing into the nearest bed for a few hours of sleep.

Mercifully, his room was ready. The woman behind the desk slid him a key card and ran through a litany of services available to him at the hotel and the wellness boutique. Chris let her talk, his face set in a polite smile, thanked her when she’d finished, signed for the incidentals, then beelined for the lift.

 

* * *

 

Chris blinked his eyes open into weak sunlight filtering in wide windows, his legs tangled up in smooth white sheets. He'd fallen asleep in a matter of seconds, still fully dressed in t-shirt and jeans. Beige stone walls and grey curtains surrounded him and, oh, right…hotel room. Amsterdam. Vincent.

Chris rolled over, flicking a glance down at his watch. It was just before three in the afternoon. He’d slept for almost four hours and still had five hours until the match.

 _Plenty of time for some food, at least_ , Chris thought as his stomach gave an audible groan of protest. He hadn’t made time for breakfast, just grabbing a coffee and some fruit at the airport and he’d slept through lunch. He'd more than needed the sleep, he knew, although he hadn’t planned on being out quite that long.

He rushed through his shower, then took his time shaving, and pulled on his cleanest t-shirt and pair of jeans. It wasn't his best—both had been worn a few times and the t-shirt was rumpled from where he'd shoved it into the corner of his luggage—but when he’d packed his bags he hadn’t exactly planned on needing to look good, so this would have to do.

Frowning, he yanked the bedcovers into some sort of order and rearranged them as best he could. He wondered if he could stop at the concierge and ask them to send someone to re-make his room. He wasn’t ordinarily that demanding, but he wanted everything to be perfect for Vincent.

His phone lay abandoned on the nightstand, and Chris flicked it on to see a string of messages from Daley waiting for him.

‘ _I’ll leave your pass at the security kiosk. Come in the players entrance._ ’

‘ _Let me know when you arrive._ ’

Twenty minutes later: ‘ _Can you be here around 18:00?_ ’

Chris scowled down at the screen. That was two hours before the match. What was he supposed to do for two hours while lurking about the Amsterdam Arena? The longer he wandered around trying to look inconspicuous, the greater the chances someone would recognise him.

His stomach gave another groan of protest and he straightened up. Right. Food. Then…off to the match, he supposed.

He grabbed his leather jacket off the chair where he’d discarded it, shoved his phone into the pocket, and headed out into the city.

 

* * *

 

Two and a half hours later, after a somewhat harrowing ten kilometre drive through gameday and weeknight traffic, Chris’s taxi pulled up to the security kiosk at the entrance to the players’ carpark. A brief exchange of messages with Daley had informed Chris that Daley had left his name at the gate with instructions to let him through. His pass should let him in the players’ entrance where Daley would meet him. Apparently he had ‘a surprise’ to give Chris.

In his experience, Daley Blind and surprises almost never went well together.

Chris wasn’t thrilled with the idea of standing around the player entrances or the tunnels below the arena, but Daley assured him everyone would be sequestered away getting ready for the match and Chris could slip in and get to his seat undetected. Still, Chris decided to proceed with caution and not turn any corners too quickly as he made his way through.

He sent Daley a message as the taxi pulled through the gates and up to the door. The sky was once again spitting rain, and Chris thanked the driver then rushed toward the shelter of the building.

He held up the pass he’d been handed at the gate—an orange rectangle of cardboard in a plastic sleeve—and stepped past the man beside the door, clad in the yellow, high-visibility vest of a stadium steward.

The too familiar red and white hallways were now festooned in the bright orange of the Dutch National team, but Chris sucked in an involuntary breath as he walked forward into his past.

He pressed himself against the wall, careful to stay concealed behind an out-of-the-way corner, hoping to keep out of sight of anyone wandering through the corridors. What was he doing here hiding in the shadows like an outsider sneaking his way into somewhere he didn’t belong? The last time he'd stepped into this building it had been as a proud member of AFC Ajax, striding forward with his head held high as he had so many other times in his life.

Above him, carts laden down with supplies for the shops and food kiosks lining the wide hallways rumbled past. The upper corridors would be empty this far ahead of the match, save the workers readying the stadium for people. The whole building quivered in anticipation of the orange-clad masses flooding through the gates. The hopes of a collective country hung over the arena like a cloud.

Chris glanced down at the pass in his hand. Special access. Friends and family and oh, hell, what had Daley done? Chris would have to sit ensconced among the wives and girlfriends and children. He'd be tucked away from the prying eyes of the media, which was good, but also front and centre alongside the pitch and beside the team bench, easily visible to any of the players who happen to glance to the sidelines, looking to their partners for moral support.

Face-to-face with Vincent should he happen to look Chris’s way.

So much for keeping an inconspicuous low profile, at least where Vincent was concerned.

He rang Daley’s mobile again and was about to hang up on his voicemail when he heard a rushed “ _Hallo_ ,” in Daley’s breathless voice.

“Daley, what the hell?” Chris didn’t bother keeping his voice down.

“Oh, hi. Did you get your pass?” Daley kept his tone casual, although he was still panting and out of breath.

“Where are you?” Chris asked.

“Just in from training. Where are you?”

“Lurking around in the shadows debating whether or not I should come down there and kick you now or wait until the next time we play you.”

“What?” Daley asked, and, okay, Chris wasn’t exactly giving him a lot to go on.

“Friends and Family pass?” Chris asked.

“It fits all the criteria you gave me.” Daley laughed, and Chris could all but hear his eyeroll. “Media are banned. You can slide in under the radar and still have access pre- and post-match if you want it. Honestly it’s an ideal situation. Hang on, we’re on our way.”

Before Chris could protest, or ask Daley exactly who he meant by ‘we’—although he had his suspicions—the call clicked off and Chris was left standing in the corridor staring down at his phone.

A minute later, Chris heard footsteps approaching up the corridor and Daley, trailed, of course, by Jasper Cillessen, emerged through the door.

Daley, all bright white teeth and wide blue eyes, stepped forward and wrapped Chris in a hug so tight that he let out an involuntary “oof” as the breath flew out of his lungs.

“ _Hallo, Christiaan_.” Daley whispered in Chris’s ear. “ _Ik heb je gemist_.”

“Let go of me,” Chris said, not bothering to keep the annoyance from his voice as he pushed backward to duck out of Daley’s grip.

“Well, well,” Daley said in English, keeping both hands on Chris’s shoulders as he fixed him with a grin. “Nice way to thank someone who does you a favour no questions asked.”

 _That was hardly ‘no questions’_ , Chris thought, but he kept his mouth shut. It wasn’t worth the fight.

“I brought you something,” Daley said, his grin widening as his eyes lit up.

“You…what?” Chris asked.

“Well,” Daley said, turning to Jasper with an adoring smile. “We brought you something. All credit to Jasper, really.”

He wrapped an arm around Jasper’s shoulders, pulling him forward. Jasper took a second to grin over at Daley before holding out a long-life shopping bag toward Chris.

Chris took the bag from Jasper, then peered inside, not at all sure what to expect. It could be anything when these two were involved.

A flash of sky blue and orange, and Chris reached inside, his fingers brushing against familiar fabric that was cool and smooth to the touch. Chris tugged at the material until he liberated the object, letting the bag fall to the floor at his feet.

A Nike issue training jacket, Netherlands crest on the chest.

Chris held the jacket up in front of him, eyes scanning up and down. The fabric was clean and pressed, although the various snags and pulls along the front indicated some level of hard use.

Chris narrowed his eyes at Daley and Jasper. “What is this?”

“Just thought you might like it,” Daley said, and Chris did not trust the cheeky grin plastered across his face. “Blend in a bit. Really get into the spirit of things.”

Jasper’s face was set in the same smirk, and oh, this couldn’t be good. “Don’t worry, it’s an extra. He won’t even miss it. We all have three or four of them.”

Words washing over Chris for a moment and then…”Did you say…”

Chris ripped at the fabric, flipping it around in his hands. Nothing. No identifying marks, no numbers or names or…oh fuck.

There, just inside the collar, Chris spotted a faded number 9 written in washfast marker.

His heart pounded in his chest as the walls around him started to blur and oh. Fuck.

He reached out an arm, grasping for the nearest wall to steady himself, but Daley stepped forward and wrapped an arm around his waist.

“Whoa, hey. That wasn’t quite the reaction I expected.” Daley’s voice was low in his ear as he helped Chris to his feet, warm hand still firm against Chris’s arm. Chris’s head still spinning.

His stomach churned and he instantly regretted his extra cup of soup with lunch.

Daley’s body was a solid warmth against Chris’s side, and Chris should probably be concerned about how comfortable he felt tucked up against Daley Blind, but he had other things to worry about right now.

Like how the hell Daley Blind and Jasper Cillessen knew about him and Vincent.

“How did you…?” Chris managed to gasp out.

Beside him, Daley shrugged. “Jasper told me. I mentioned that you’d asked me for a ticket and…”

“And I’d been speaking with Matthias because he wanted to know about Barcelona and we got to talking, you know,” Jasper continued, words pouring out of him rapid fire. “And he mentioned that he’d been sitting with Stef at dinner and Stef was talking to Tonny who said we should ease up on Vincent a little because he’s been having a hard time lately since he had to leave London and because he'd gotten so comfortable there…”

“And we just sort of put it all together,” Daley finished. “It makes total sense when you think about it.”

A whispered,“fuck”, was all Chris could manage.

He dropped his head to his hands. If Daley had figured it out, who else had? Some of their teammates played in the Premier League with him and if they knew then…

Chris sucked in a breath and held it. Then another. Then another. _Breathe, Christian. Remember breathing?_

“Daley, who else knows?”

“No one knows as far as I’m aware. Honestly we were just guessing, but by your reaction we got it right. I know you, Christian. I know your type. I mean…I used to be your type, so…”

 _And oh_ , Chris thought, _thanks for that reminder, Daley._

Daley and Vincent were two drastically different people, Daley all exuberant energy and Vincent all heartfelt emotion, yet Chris had been drawn to them both in such a similar way. In both cases he hadn't been looking for anything more than the easy camaraderie he had with any of his teammates, but before he knew it he'd gotten caught up in their magnetism. Each of them had managed to draw Chris in and wrap him up in their presence, Christian powerless in their wake, although in both cases it had taken him ages to realise it.

“Does he know you know?” His voice, when he found it, sounded quiet and strained.

“I haven’t mentioned it,” Daley said, “So probably not.”

“Good,” Chris said, looking up to meet Daley’s eyes. “Don’t. Daley, please just…I know to you it means nothing, that you don’t care what people know, but to me…”

The arm around his waist tightened as Daley pulled him closer. “I know, Chris. I would never. Not a word to anyone. I swear.” And somehow, for some reason, Chris believed him.

Chris let out a breath and risked opening his eyes. When the floor didn’t pitch and rock around him, he figured he was probably safe and stepped out of Daley’s grip.

“For the record, I promise too. Not to say anything, I mean,” Jasper said, reaching out to pat Chris on the arm. “It’s not our business anyway, really.”

“Thanks,” Chris said. “For that. And for this.”

He shrugged out of his leather jacket and slipped into the training top, the material cool, sleek, and familiar against his bare skin. Vincent’s jacket had been recently laundered, but…

Chris felt his eyes widen as he caught a whiff of citrus and oak—earthy, woodsy, spicy. The smell surrounded him. and he breathed in deep, filling his nose with Vincent’s scent.

Another wide grin and a laugh from Daley. “Did I not tell you, Chris. I took the top he wore in out of his locker after we got here this morning. I wasn’t going to give you one that smelled like a day on the training pitch.”

Sleeves falling down around his hands, fabric pooling and bunching beneath his arms, Chris tugged at the jacket, pulling the collar high so he could bury his face in Vincent’s scent.

“ _Kleintje_ ,” Daley teased.

“Stop laughing at me.” Chris tossed a glare in Daley’s direction, but there wasn’t any malice in it.

“It’s adorable. I just…” he dropped a hand back to Chris’s shoulder. “Vincent’s lucky. Trust me, I know. And to have you come all the way here for him…well…I don't think you would have done this for me.”

“It's all for nothing, probably,” Chris said. “It’s not as though I’ll see him. Maybe a few minutes after the match with the whole stadium looking on.”

Daley pursed his lips for a few minutes, then nodded. “Right. Don’t worry about that. Go enjoy the match.”

“Daley what are you plotting?”

But Daley was already turned away, elbow linked with Jasper’s as the two turned back toward the tunnels.

“Must run,” Daley said. “They’ll miss us at training. Enjoy the match.”

“Yeah,” Chris said, and then, “Daley, Jasper. Thanks.”

“Any time Chris. Don’t forget you owe me coffee. Probably a few of them, anyway.”

Chris couldn’t help a small laugh. “More than a few. _Succes_ out there tonight.”

Daley raised his eyebrows. “Time to make magic happen, yeah?”

And with that, he and Jasper headed back around the corner and disappeared, leaving Chris standing alone in the hallway, wrapped in the smell of home.

 

* * *

 

Chris stood surrounded by a sea of orange, chants and songs falling down around him as the Hollanders screamed their team toward victory.

The Arena was bathed in light and smoke. This had been his home stadium for so many years, although it was his no longer. Chris was packed into the stands, and he’d been here before—on this side of things—but never for this. Red and white now shifted to brilliant orange on all sides.

Familiar strains of _Het Wilhelmus_ filled the air, and Chris sang along, though it wasn’t his anthem.

He'd found a beanie from one of the shops and now wore it pulled low over his ears. It wasn't his style in the least, but it served as protection against the rain and any stray glances that might happen to fall his way. Leather jacket tucked safely onto the chair behind him, he ducked down further into the collar of Vincent’s training top, sinking into the scent.

Vincent. Standing on the field a few metres away. Closer than he’d been in months. In the same city, the same building, breathing the same air for a few hours at least. Chris pressed himself down harder into his seat to keep from racing to the railing, leaning over, and screaming Vincent’s name until his throat was raw.

 _Inconspicuous, Chris_ , he reminded himself. _You won’t do anyone any good if you cause a scene._

He sank back into his chair, gripping the sides as he trained his eyes on the field. On Vincent.

Team on the pitch, ready for kickoff. Vincent standing over the ball. Poised. The crowd around him holding a collective breath as they waited for the whistle blast. Whispered prayers on the wind, and Chris sent up one of his own.

_Please let him score. Let him win. Let me see his smile._

 

* * *

 

The match ended in victory for _Oranje_ , but it stung like defeat. Two goals hadn't been enough. Half-hearted applause rained down as the crowds serenaded and the players milled around the pitch hands raised in thanks to the supporters who hadn’t stopped cheering them on for ninety straight minutes. Chris stood on his feet along with them, clapping and whistling.

Vincent had been subbed off in the second half, and Chris knew how he would take it. He wasn’t good enough. The team needed a better striker on the pitch, a real attacking threat. Chris could hear the words in his head; could picture himself kissing them away from Vincent’s lips.

He caught the faint sound of someone calling his name through the din, and he looked up to see Daley halfway down the tunnel, waving to him. His words were inaudible above the music pumping from the speakers and the buzz of the crowd around him.

Chris gave Daley a shrug, spreading his palms wide, then pointed to his ear and shook his head.

Daley nodded, then waved Chris toward him and pointed down the tunnel, but Chris shook his head. He didn’t care if Vincent saw him now, not really, but that didn’t mean he needed his face plastered across the news headlines complete with a string of questions about why he was at the match, outfitted head to toe in Netherlands gear, no less.

Then again, the seats around him were emptying quickly as wives and girlfriends lifted children from their seats and made their way toward the sidelines, leaving Chris one of only a handful of people still in the stands. He’d probably be more conspicuous just standing there than he would if he made his way onto the pitch and tried to lose himself in the crowd.

He held up a hand to tell Daley to stay where he was, then made his way toward the gate that would lead him to the pitch.

Down the short flight of stairs, Chris stepped out onto the slick grass of the sidelines, soft and spongy under his feet. Standing at the edge of the quickly emptying arena, Chris took a moment to breathe in the smell and the feel of it all. A deep breath, just one, eyes closed, surrounded by the power of this place.

His eyes snapped open as a hand brushed his arm, flooding him with warmth in the chill of the evening. Daley. His hair dripping with water and sweat, his shirt soaked through. His chest heaved as his lungs worked, still trying to catch his breath. He’d left everything on the pitch, Chris knew. Given his all for his country, and what could Chris say besides “I’m sorry.”

Daley ran a hand through his hair, shoving it away from his face. “It wasn’t meant to be. We gave it our all out there. It stings, but…nevermind. Should I take you to Vincent?”

Chris shook his head. “No. Not now. I…he needs to be with the team. I know how these things go. It’s not for me to…I’m not a part of it.”

Daley narrowed his eyes at Chris. “Why come all the way here if you’re not even going to talk to him?”

“I can’t. Not here. Things between us, they’re complicated and…”

A shake of the head, then Daley’s grip on Chris’s arm tightened as he headed toward the entrance to the tunnel, dragging Chris along after him.

He pulled Chris down the tunnel and into a small alcove that was out of sight of the on-field cameras, although still visible to anyone making their way to the dressing rooms. A sea of people streamed past: players dripping wet with rain, coaching staff, wives, girlfriends, children.

The buzz of voices and the clatter of spikes on cement filled the air. In the distance, some Dutch pop song Chris didn’t know still drifted in from the stadium PA system.

“Stay here,” Daley said, his tone commanding as he stared straight into Chris’s eyes.

Chris opened his mouth to protest, but the words died on his tongue as Jasper rounded the corner into the tunnel, his hand on the elbow of a familiar figure as he pulled him off the field and down the tunnel.

His brown hair, shorter than it had been when he'd left London, had been darkened by the rain from chestnut to a rich coffee hue. His skin, now a warm gold from the Istanbul sunshine, glistened with sweat and rain in the lights of the arena.

Vincent’s face moved through a whole range of emotions in the short distance it took him to step down the tunnel— his eyes narrowed in annoyance at Jasper dragging him by the elbow, then widened as he slid through confusion to disbelief and finally recognition, a wide smile taking over his entire face.

Time slowed to a crawl as they moved toward one another, the music and voices and clatter of boots down the tunnel fading away. Chris stood alone in the din of the crowd as he fixed his eyes on Vincent’s.

His body was enveloped in heat as Vincent hugged him, lifting him from the ground and pulling him close. Chris caught the sharp tang of sweat and he pressed his face in close, breathing in Vincent’s scent. Vincent’s arms. His skin against Vincent’s skin. Scratch of stubble against his face.

“It’s really you,” Vincent breathed, hot breath on Chris’s neck.

“Yeah,” Chris forced the words out, his own breath caught in his throat, and Vincent’s arms, Vincent’s chest, Vincent’s face, Vincent’s voice.

Too soon, his feet hit the ground and Vincent pulled away, Chris already missing his warmth. He tugged his jacket tighter around him.

A soft smile and shake of the head as Vincent scanned him head to toe. “What are you wearing?”

“I…” Chris started, ducking his head in embarrassment, because, yeah, what _was_ he wearing, but before he could come up with an explanation, Daley beat him to it.

“I gave him one of your warmups. I didn’t think you’d mind.”

Vincent spun around, startled to remember they had an audience. ‘You what? I…wait, I was wondering where that went. I had to go to the equipment staff and get a new one.”

"I can…give it back. Here."

Chris started pulling at the zipper, but Vincent covered Chris's hand with his own. "No. Keep it. It looks good on you."

The tips of Chris's ears flushed pink as Vincent watched him through lowered eyelashes, and Chris was glad for this stupid beanie. He sucked in a breath, every ounce of his willpower directed toward not pressing Vincent against the wall and kissing him until they were both breathless and gasping for air.

Chris clenched his free hand into a fist, fingernails gouging into his palms as he forced himself to take a step back and put some distance between himself and Vincent even though he wanted nothing more than to close that gap and never let go.

Vincent's eyes were dark with desire, his voice low and rough. "What are you doing here? I mean, don’t think I’m not thrilled to see you, but…”

“I told you I’d be here for you.”

 

 

 

**11 October, 2017— Amsterdam, The Netherlands**

Hours later—the clock rolled far past midnight, carrying them into a new day—Chris lay awake staring at the shadows dancing on the ceiling of yet another hotel room. This time, though, he was wrapped in Vincent’s warmth, their bodies once more tangled together in the dark.

Only a few more hours together until daylight came and carried them both away once more.

Moonlight poured in through the room's wide windows, bathing them both in pale light.

Chris rolled onto his side and tucked himself up against Vincent, who stirred beneath him and pulled Chris in closer.

“You should get some sleep,” Chris said, his hands tracing the lines of Vincent’s broad chest.

“Not a chance,” Vincent replied. “I don’t want to miss a single second of our time together. Besides, I’ve got a three hour flight ahead of me. That's plenty of time for sleep.”

Chris scooted upward, tilting his head until his mouth met Vincent’s and he was rewarded with the swipe of Vincent’s tongue against his own and the drag of stubble against his cheek, Vincent’s mouth warm and bitter.

Fingers traced the line of Chris’s spine. Warm hands on Chris’s skin, running up and down the length of his body. The pressure of his fingers saying everything neither of them could give voice to.

Vincent broke the kiss first, his chest heaving beneath Chris’s hands as he gasped for air.

“I still can’t believe you’re here.”

Chris dropped his head back to Vincent’s chest, pressing their bodies together once more. Fitting himself into the space beside Vincent as though he'd never left it.

Stupid, as always. Monumentally, stupendously stupid. A few hours together in the dark of an Amsterdam night and then back to London in the morning, wounds re-opened, bleeding and aching and raw. But right now, pressed beside Vincent in the dark, the air around them filled with their mingled scents, he couldn’t bring himself to care.

He smiled up at Vincent, pressing a kiss to his chest just above his heart.

“For you, I’d go anywhere.”

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[podfic] Stay In My Eyeline](https://archiveofourown.org/works/14844155) by [kaixo (ballpoint)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ballpoint/pseuds/kaixo)




End file.
